


The Measure Of A Year

by Rainah (RainahFiclets)



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Foster Care, Gen, Genderqueer Marquis de Lafayette, Group Homes, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Psychotropic Drugs, Trans Alexander Hamilton, Trans Character, Underage Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 22:52:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9038465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RainahFiclets/pseuds/Rainah
Summary: He didn’t need a group home. He didn’t need anyone. He was perfectly fine, thank you very much, and all the foster system was doing was getting in the way. He’d had a job. There was no reason he couldn’t be emancipated at 16. Only his social worker had disagreed, so he’d run and tried to make it on his own.
 Alex, having exhausted all his foster care options and fresh off a runaway attempt, finds himself in Vernon House Group Home. It's better in a lot of ways, worse in others, and it just might be the chance he needs.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jaekakes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaekakes/gifts).



> sooooo another edition into Rainah's "Absurdly well researched AUs". I work in a group home that serves this type of youth population, and I wanted to write something that showed a different side of the foster system. As I'm not american, I will also be supplementing my knowledge with David Peltzer's foster care memoir The Lost Boy, a book entitled Fostergirls, and whatever I need to google.
> 
> This is a gift for [Jules](http://simplyghouls.tumblr.com/), who's such a wonderful friend to me. May your christmas be filled with light and joy.

Alex sighed, staring out the window as they drove farther and farther out of Manhattan. He _liked_ the city. The city was business, brashness, endless possibilities. This was suburbia, slowly fading into countryside. “Why does it have to be so far away?”

“So kids like you can’t run away,” came the dry reply from his social worker. “It’s forty minutes walking down a dirt road before you even come to an intersection, you won’t be able to take off from here.”

“Fine.” Alex just sighed again. Running away from placements was his preferred method of dealing with things, so they were bound to try this eventually.

“Try and make this one work?” Stevens said, with a sigh to match Alex’s. “I know a group home doesn’t sound like the most fun thing in the world, but there are some upsides. Lots of kids your age, a good environment, people who can give you the support you need-”

“I don’t need support,” Alex snapped. 

His social worker didn’t bite. “Everyone needs support. Even the most capable of adults need support in their lives. Just… try and keep an open mind, alright? We want you to be successful.”

 _Because you’re running out of places to put me._ When Stevens had picked him up, he’d begged not to be moved out of the state. But now, as the sub developments turned to farms and fields, he began to reconsider. The farmland seemed so… isolated. Static. He was built for  <>cities, not this. Should he have let Stevens move him out of state? Was a house in The Middle Of Nowhere, New York, better than Chicago? He could have made Chicago work.

Too late now. The road was indeed dirt, pulling up to a large farmhouse with a wraparound porch. A boy and a girl were on the steps; the girl smoking, the boy coughing. Both looked up warily as the car approached.

“Shift change!” the girl called into the house.

“I’m afraid not,” Stevens said, getting out of the car. “Just bringing your new resident.”

Alex flushed as he got out of the car. _Better get this out of the way._ “I’m Alexander,” he said, stressing the masculine name. _Regardless of what I look like._

Neither of them blinked. “Cool,” the girl said, taking another drag off her cigarette. “Pronouns?”

It was Alex’s turn to blink, staring at them in confusion. “Uh, he.”

“Cool. Maria,” She pointed to herself, “and James,” she pointed to the boy, who was even smaller than she was. “You got cigarettes? Hide any contraband before you go in, they’ll confiscate it.”

Mr. Stevens was already shaking his head disappointingly. “Nothing like that,” Alex said. “Just books.”

She waved him away, already uninterested. “Ugh, nevermind.”

“Come on Alex, let's get you acquainted with your new home,” Stevens said. Because of _course_ Alex wanted to go settle into the house of screwups he had been being regulated to.

He didn’t need a group home. He didn’t need anyone. He was perfectly fine, thank you very much, and all the foster system was doing was getting in the way. He’d _had_ a job. There was no reason he couldn’t be emancipated at 16. Only his social worker had disagreed, so he’d run and tried to make it on his own.

That, along with his smart mouth and his rejection of the gender the world had assigned him, made him a ‘poor candidate for the foster system as this time’. Translation: ‘we ran out of foster families willing to put up with you, welcome to communal living’. 

God, they were probably going to make him share a bathroom. As soon as Alex got into the house he gave himself a quick tour, trusting Stevens to sort out his paperwork. Upstairs were four bedrooms - labeled ‘Maria’, ‘John’, ‘Laf & Herc’, and ‘Thomas & James’. Alex scowled. They’d better not have put him in with what appeared to be the only girl. Just to be contrary, he moved to shove over the door to John’s room - just to check and see if there was a bed for him there.

But as he moved to grab the handle, a voice said, “Hey! Don’t touch that!” 

“What?” Alex turned, regarding the tall stranger poking out of the ‘Laf & Herc’ room. 

“I said don’t touch that, man, it’s John’s room and he gets touchy. Are you a resident or staff?” the man asked.

“Resident.” The word brought a scowl to his face, dampened slightly by the fact that the stranger had called him _man_.

“Awesome. I’m Herc.” Herc held out his hand. “That’s John’s room, you can’t go in there because it’s John’s room and he’ll be mad. You can come in mine, though.”

“I don’t want to go in yours,” Alex shot back. He didn’t take Herc’s proffered hand, but the boy didn’t retract it. “I just want to know where my room is.”

“If you’re a resident you’ll have Thomas’ bed. He’s been AWOL too long, they gave it away.”

“Wonderful.” So he was sharing with James, the small boy from outside. At least there should be space. Alex turned to go into the other room, stopped again by Herc’s voice. 

“It’s the master, so there’s a bathroom attached, but you can’t use it. It’s James’ bathroom.”

“Alright,” Alex snapped. “Why don’t you tell me what I _can_ use and I’ll get right on that instead.”

“Alex!” Stevens called from downstairs. 

Alex could only roll his eyes. “Nevermind. My worker.”

“That’s okay.” Herc seemed thoroughly unbothered by his sharp tone. “Talk to you later.”

Alex stomped downstairs for the obligatory introductions. Mostly that meant meeting the staff of the house, going over rules, and learning that a woman named Kitty was going to be ‘helping you settle in’. 

“Do you prefer Alex or Alexandria?” Kitty asked him politely.

“I prefer Alexander,” Alex snapped. “But Alex is fine. I’m a boy.”

“Okay, Alexander,” Kitty smiled hopefully at him. “You know, we have another resident here, Lafayette, who’s nonbinary. I’m sure you’ll get along great with them-”

Ah. That explained it then. He wasn’t a trailblazer here, just another cog in the machine.

“Kitty, I need to go over Alex’s medication with you,” Stevens interrupted.

“Of course! I can pass it along to our evening shift lead when he gets in.”

“Okay. So, as it says in his file that Alex went off all his meds the last time he AWOL’d so we’re having to reintroduce them. As such, there might be some instability as you build up the dose…”

As they talked Alex wandered into the next room. Here he saw a kid his own age reading a copy of _Watchmen_ and an adult (presumably more staff) reading a book in a chair nearby. They both lowered their books as he entered the room.

“Are you going to say hello to the new girl?” the adult man drawled, giving Alex a clinical once over.

“Not a girl,” he growled. “He. Alexander.”

The boy had turned to glare at his staff the moment the man spoke - now he turned his dark eyes on Alex. “Cool. John. Also he, despite the hair.” Indeed, John’s curls were long enough to brush his shoulders. “What’s your diagnosis?”

“John,” the staff said warningly.

John flipped him off, not even turning to look.

“Do I need to get Kitty?”

“Don’t test me, Charles,” John shot right back. “I’m sick of you. How much longer are you here?”

“Until seven pm.” Charles didn’t sound any happier about it. “So let’s make it a good night.”

“Make it a night I don’t have to hit you and it’ll be a good start,” John muttered. Charles moved as if he was going to say something, but John talked right over him. “I swear to God I will hit you, Charles. And it will hurt. And then you will have to file a serious incident report, which I know take forever.” He turned back to Alex, continuing on as if nothing had happened. “So. What’s your brand of crazy?”

Alex just stared. Was he expected to just list them off? Well, okay. “Gender Identity Disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, and Bipolar. They were waffling with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder but I got moved first. I also take Melatonin for insomnia.”

“Cool, another ODD.” John indicated himself. “Oppositional Defiant and Major Depressive. I’m having a good day,” he informed Alex.

“We’ll see about that,” Charles muttered from the couch. 

“Give me space, Charles,” John demanded. “Go read in the other room, you don’t have to keep me in sight.”

“Fine. Dinner’s at five thirty.” And Charles ambled off into the other room, pulling his phone out as he went.

“I have a 1x1 staff for twelve hours a day,” John explained, gesturing that Alex should sit on the couch with him. Alex did, keeping space between them. “But it’s not eyes-on, so they have to leave if you ask for space. Are you 1x1 or a floor kid?”

Alex frowned. “Floor, I think?” 

“Cool. Laf and Maria are too. Herc has a three hour 1x1 after school to help him adjust, and James has one twenty-four seven until he can sleep through the night. They’ve put him on new meds,” John explained.

All the names were making his head spin. “Are there always so many kids?”

“Always has to be six. Keep the beds filled, the money rolling in.” John rolled his eyes, then made a tsking sound. “You don’t have a phone, do you? I’m bored as hell.”

“Nope.” He’d sold it when he’d run away. “You can’t watch TV?” There was a rather large one sitting there, along with an X-Box.

“Not allowed,” John said sadly. “I’m still on consequences for kicking Sam last week. No electronics and no community time; basically I get to sit here and read.” He tossed the comic carelessly onto the table.

Alex shuddered at the idea of being trapped in the house with nothing to do. _Don’t get put on consequences then_. “I can keep you company,” he offered. “I don’t think I’m allowed out anyway, I tried to run away.”

“You and everyone else in this dump,” John snickered, putting his feet up on the table now that Charles was out of sight. “Most of us have tried to run at some point. Thomas was the only one I’ve seen actually manage it though, and I’ve been here three years.”

“Ah, John.” Kitty joined them, brushing back her hair. Blonde haired and blue eyed, she stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the rest of the household. “Are you showing Alexander around?”

“Nah,” John drawled, and Alex was surprised to hear hints of an accent there. John caught his eye and grinned. “He’s keeping me company. Don’t feel like getting up.”

Kitty clucked her tongue. “You didn’t go to school today, you should be up for walking Alexander around and introducing him.”

“Don’t feel like it,” John shrugged. It was deliberately insolent, and Kitty scowled.

"Fine, Alexander, I'll show you around-"

"I'd like to stay with John, if that's okay," he said quickly. Then he lied. "Too many names, I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed."

"Of _course_ you are," Kitty practically cooed. "I'm going to get started on dinner then, if you _boys_ are alright here. John, please try to be nice."

He gave her a sardonic smile. "My therapist tells me to be open about my feelings."

As soon as they were alone again John relaxed, leaning back into the couch. Alex stayed perched on the edge, unwilling to be vulnerable so soon. He liked John though, liked his brashness and his sharpness.

 _There's room for sharp boys here_ , he couldn't help but think. _Sharp boys and sick boys and boys who weren't called boys when they were born._

"So?" John prompted him.

"What?"

"You said you were going to entertain me, I'm waiting. Are you going to dance, or sing, or...? Recite poetry?"

There was no way Alex was going to offer up his poetry to John's mocking smile. "Can't do any of those things."

"Well damn, you're about as useless as I am then. I guess you're going to have to talk. What's your story? Are you a state ward?"

State wards were how they referred to those in the system. Foster kids. Alex nodded, then frowned. "Wait, isn't everyone here a state ward?"

"Nope." He nodded at Maria and James, who had just come in the door. "Maria was taken away, but James' parents left him here. He visits them for two hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays."

"Why would they do that?" Alex couldn't even imagine. Had his mother been alive, he knew there was nothing that would prevent her from being with him.

"Couldn't deal." John shrugged as if it didn't matter much. "Herc's grandparents are the same way, they can't decide if they're adopting him or not. He spends weekends with them, overnight. His mom's a no contact, but he still sees his dad every month or so."

"That's nice," Alex said mechanically. He didn't know what a _no contact_ entailed, but it didn't sound good. It made him miss his mom more than ever.

"So Herc and James's folks still technically have custody," John was explaining. "Maria, Laf, and I are wards of the state."

"Did your parents die too?" Alex asked.

John didn't reply for a long moment, and Alex thought suddenly that he'd made a mistake. God, John was probably one of those abused kids and Alex was dredging up awful memories and now John was going to hate him.

But no, John merely sucked in several short breaths and said evenly, "I'm not allowed to read my file, not until I turn sixteen. So I don't know. I've been in these places as long as I can remember."

He didn't have a lot to say to that. "Oh, okay. My mom died when I was twelve."

"And your dad?"

"Gone." Alex tried to shrug, tried to approximate the same level of disinterest John had displayed. It didn't work. "Left ages ago, they couldn't find him to tell him... to tell him we were all alone."

"We?" John's eyebrow raised.

"My brother and I." It had been two years since he had seen James. They'd emailed, and skyped in the beginning. But James' new family didn't like anything that connected him to his old life and eventually, James' replies had died off. Alex still sent messages from time to time, but the replies he got were short.

“I had a sister,” John confided. “Foster sister. Martha. I have a picture up in my room.”

“Cool.” He used to have pictures of James and the rest of his family. They’d gotten lost, somewhere in his many moves. But Stevens had some he’d scanned into a computer, so Alex could still look at them sometimes.

“Do you like comics?” John asked, indicating _Watchmen_.

Alex shrugged. “Sure.” He didn’t really, but having a friend here would go a long way into making it bearable. Especially one who seemed to know as much as John did.

John opened the book, shifting over to let Alex see the pictures. “That’s the Comedian, he’s a dick but he’s still a good guy…”

Dinner was a lively affair. There he was formally introduced to Maria, with her eyes lined thick with kohl; James, the small boy whose preferred activity seemed to be staring into space; and Lafayette, who was every bit as interesting as he'd imagined. Tall and lanky, they had their dark hair pulled up in a ponytail to better show off the makeup they were wearing. Alex exchanged brief pleasantries with all the kids, making sure to stress his name whenever he got the chance.

As it was a Friday, Herc had already excused himself and been picked up in a battered minivan by what was presumably his grandparents. Still, there were five at the table, plus John's staff, James' staff, and someone to watch the rest of them. Not everyone was eating - Lafayette had pushed the sheppard's pie away citing food sensitivities. Maria had shoved hers away citing the grossness of sheppard's pie. John had eaten Laf's portion in addition to his own, and pushed Maria's towards Alex. 

"Seconds are okay here?" he asked, just to make sure.

"Seconds are definitely okay," John nodded. "Eat as much as you want, James is going to leave at least half of his on the plate." Indeed James was merely pushing his food around. 

Alex's ate all of Maria's, but declined anymore. He wasn't used to eating so much food. They each washed their plates, retiring to whatever they wanted for the evening. Laf turned on the X-Box, John watching jealously. James went to bed, but not before swallowing a handful of medications from Kitty.

Maria flopped down over John's legs. "Ask your 1x1 to take you to McDonald’s."

"Get off me." John shoved her, but she managed to wriggle out of the worst of it. 

"I'm hungry," she complained. "I want McDonald’s."

"You wouldn't be hungry if you'd eaten your supper," Charles said firmly. "Besides, John is on consequences and not allowed out of the house."

"What did you do now?" Maria snorted. She still hadn't moved.

"Kicked Sam," Lafayette supplied from the other side of the room.

"Ah. Probably deserved it." She turned to Alex, appealing with her dark eyes. "Do you have a 1x1? Get me McDonald’s, I'll pay you back with a kiss."

Alex's eyes slid down to her impossibly red lips. He swallowed.

"Maria," Charles warned. "Leave Alex alone. That's not appropriate behavior."

John kicked out with his foot. "Why are you such a hardcase, Charles? Get off our backs."

Lafayette spoke up above Charles' muttered reply of _it's my job_. "My strawberries are in the fridge, Maria, you can have those."

"Thanks, babe.” She blew him a kiss, ambling off towards the kitchen.  
John snickered, Lafayette shot him a look.

“She’s trouble,” John explained to Alex.

“Maybe so,” Lafayette shrugged, “but she still needs to eat. And she was harassing the new kid.”

Alex flushed, unwilling to admit that he had hardly minded. Instead he changed the subject. “So what are the rules here?” Surely there would be many, even more so than a foster home.

Both John and Lafayette began counting them off their fingers, voice overlapping.

“Curfew is nine if you have community time, bed by ten-”

“We’re not allowed in the staff office, that room there. That’s where they keep the files, the sharps, the meds, and anything we’re not allowed to have unsupervised-”

“There’s a list of food we’re allowed to have on the fridge, but we can pretty much eat whatever we want-”

“Even if you refuse to go to school you’re not allowed to sleep in, you have to wake up and eat on time as a ‘school routine’.”

“Didn’t you go over this with your worker?” Lafayette asked him critically. “Did you not do the big plan of care meeting?”

“Not yet.” Alex kicked out, his heel just nicking the table. “Next week. My worker had to go back to town for a big meeting.”

“Did they leave your meds at least?” Alex shrugged. “What about your school records?” Another shrug, this one with a frown. “They didn’t leave anything?”

“I don’t know, okay?” he burst out. “It’s all them, that’s all Stevens and the agency. I don’t know what they do. They push me around from one place to another and don’t bother to tell me anything. Nobody cares enough to tell me what the hell is going on, nobody cares if I screw up because I don’t know the rules, nobody _cares_.”

He looked up, embarrassed by his outburst. Neither Lafayette nor John seemed concerned, and his attention immediately shifted to the two concerned staff hovering in the doorway.

“We care about you here, Alexander,” Kitty said immediately. “We’re happy you’re here and we look forward to getting to know you.” In the corner of his eye, Alex saw John roll his eyes.

“Bedtime, I think.” Charles walked past them, heading for the office as everyone groaned. “For everyone.”

“It’s not even nine thirty!” John protested. “Just because there’s a new kid going off doesn’t mean you have to treat us like we’re unstable children-”

Alex tried not to recoil. _So much for friends_.

“I’m getting meds,” Charles continued as if John had not spoken. “Come on.”

“Fine,” John spat. He pushed himself up off the ground and walked over to stand beside the door as Charles disappeared inside the office. Alex watched in fascination as Charles emerged and handed John a handful of pills. John swallowed them all dry. 

“I’m taking the first shower,” Lafayette said, darting up the stairs. They did not appear to have any meds to take.

“Alex, I have yours. One moment.” And Charles disappeared back inside the office, shutting the door.

“Are they going to make us go to sleep?” Alex asked, despite a reluctance to talk to John.

“You don’t have to sleep, but you have to go up to your room and lay down. What’s up?” he asked suddenly. “That worried about bedtime?”

“No. I mean,” he clarified, “I don’t sleep that much. I just-” _am bothered by you treating me like a hindrance._

“Did I say something?” John asked frankly. When Alex nodded, he said “Look, I say a lot of crap I don’t mean. I’m sorry or whatever. Just take your meds and tomorrow I’ll show you around.”

Strangely enough, John’s terrible apology did make him feel better. Probably because he knew it was genuine, at least. “But we have school tomorrow.”

“There is no way they have your school stuff sorted, you don’t even have a plan of care yet. And I don’t feel like going.” 

“Don’t… feel like going?” It couldn’t be that easy, just _deciding_ not to go to school. Alex was pretty sure there were laws about that thing.

“I’ll tell you a secret,” John grinned, “the staff have a tendency to pick and choose their battles. It’s usually not worth it to _make_ us go to school if we’re only going to AWOL or cause a scene.”

“...I like school,” Alex admitted. Just then Charles came out with a handful of pills and a glass of water for him.

“Here you go, Alex. These are the prescriptions sent over by your last psychiatrist, you’ll be meeting ours later in the week.” 

Alex looked down at the little pills Charles dumped into his hand. He wasn’t a hundred percent sure what all of them were - one was prozac, he knew, another was his melatonin. But overall his foster families had never felt the need to explain in depth. Another thing he didn’t have control over.

 _A new start_. A new house, a new community, a new chance at life. This time, he wasn’t going to let them take away control of his life. But it wasn’t a battle he could fight today.

He looked up at John, tossing the pills into his mouth and washing them down with water.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on [here](http://www.thellamaduo.tumblr.com), where I love to chat
> 
> As always, comments and kudos are loved.


End file.
